Balancing your content for both people and search engine spiders is simply about giving them what they want: useful and relevant information.

People vs. Spiders: No, it’s not a court case…but it is perhaps one of the most important things to consider when writing for the Web, especially if your goal is to improve SEO and page rankings.

Ideally, your Web content will satisfy both people and search engine spiders (also known as Web crawlers or bots). Of course, that’s easier said than done.

Here are some tips and concepts to consider:

• Determine your page’s goal: Note that this does not say “site’s goal.”

A site contains many pages, and each of those pages should have a clearly defined goal, which may or may not be the same as the site’s overall goal or strategy.

For instance, is your page primarily optimized to attract incoming traffic so that guests will convert on a call to action? Or is it truly intended to deliver a page of useful information?

• Use multiple strategies: For example, if you have a hospital site, you’ll want to provide content that attracts new visitors and patients, but also gives them critical information about your physicians, services and facilities.

So perhaps slant your content toward spiders on generic pages such as the “About Us” or “Our Location” or “News” pages, but lean towards people on “Physicians” and “Services” pages that explain why you are truly the best choice for a patient’s needs.

• Mind your metadata: People typically don’t read metadata, but search engine spiders do!

In particular, pay attention to title tags, headline (or <H1>) tags and last but not least, alt tags for images. While you are at it, tag your keywords, too.

• Watch your code-to-text ratios: If your page doesn’t have much text, it likely doesn’t contain much in terms of relevant keywords or information, and thus, won’t satisfy either people or spiders.

But even if it does have plenty of text, if your page has too much HTML code, a spider might not scan the page in its entirety, leaving out potentially crucial and relevant information (in particular, keywords).

• Break up your content: Instead of trying to cover several subjects (or optimizing for several different keywords) on one page, divide them up into their own individual pages.

• Use the inverted pyramid style: By structuring your content so that the most keyword-relevant information is at the top, both people and spiders will get what they want.

Balancing People vs. Spiders: A Final Thought

Although there are some obvious differences between people and spiders, there are some important similarities. Also keep these in mind when writing for the Web:

• What do people and spiders want? Simple: People and spiders want useful and relevant information.

• What don’t people and spiders want? Also quite simple: They don’t want to be tricked or manipulated into thinking a page will deliver useful information when it won’t.

By giving them what they want—and avoiding what they don’t want—you will find a balanced style and strategy that rewards you with informed readers and improved page rankings.

Derek Rudnak | Communications Specialist | AVID Design

Tweet This Post

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 4th, 2009 at 8:36 am and is filed under Best Practices, SEO, SEO Tips, Tricks and Advice, Writing for the Web. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.